Sandia National Laboratories Seeks to Boost EV Safety by Quickly Detecting Battery Failures

Scientists from Sandia National Laboratories here in the U.S. are working to boost electric vehicle safety by improving the speed of battery failure detection systems. Such failures typically result in EV battery fires that cause significant property damage and can be incredibly difficult to put out. Sandia National Laboratories researchers hope to increase EV safety margins by developing methods that can detect battery failures before they snowball into fires.

Although electric vehicle fires are relatively rare, the few that occur can be incredibly destructive and usually require up to 2,500 gallons of water to put out compared to 500 to 1,500 gallons for internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicle fires. In some cases, firefighters had to use much more water to put out EV fires. As electric cars become more common on U.S. roads, the risk of EV fires in parking lots and even home garages is increasing as well.

Since battery failures can snowball into fires extremely quickly, Sandia National Laboratories wants to develop safety measures that can identify upcoming failures quickly and warn vehicle occupants in time. One researcher noted that while some EV batteries can heat up over several hours before catching fire, some battery fires can begin quite abruptly and aggressively, giving owners little to no warning time.

Sandia National Laboratories Battery safety lead Loraine Torres-Castro says the research team aims to develop a diagnostic system that can provide an early warning and give the occupants enough time to park and exit the vehicle safely. The team hopes to integrate the battery failure warning system on the dashboard where the driver can spot it as soon as it lights up, Torres-Castro says.

According to Torres-Castro, the objective is to analyze different commercial off-the-shelf diagnostics solutions for different types of EV battery failures that show varied responses and need ‘tailored diagnostics.’ She added that the team is looking for diagnostic warning tools that can function in particular cell engineering, battery chemistries, and failure conditions.

Torres-Castro says the research team boasts a wide variety of experts and has an intimate understanding of electrochemistry, material science, and why electric vehicle batteries fail. The researchers are currently testing commercial diagnostic solutions on battery packs and single battery cells at the Battery Abuse Testing Laboratory (BATLab).

A recent Journal of Electrochemical Society paper outlines the Sandia research team’s studies in greater detail. It covered the techniques electric cars use to detect signs of impending failures and may have applications that stretch beyond the electric vehicle sector. Torres-Castro said the research team is now working with a South Korean organization to determine whether grid energy storage can also benefit from this technique.

As concerns about EV fires are addressed through the diagnostics system being developed by Sandia National Laboratories, buyer hesitation towards EVs could go down and manufacturers like Cenntro Electric Group Ltd (NASDAQ: CENN) could record increasing sales.

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